In the World of the High Tech Redneck, the Graybeard is the old guy who earned his gray by making all the mistakes, and then tries to keep the young 'uns from repeating them. Silicon Graybeard is my term for an old hardware engineer; a circuit designer. Here are mental droppings from a newly retired radio engineer running from tech news to economics; from firearms to the world at large; from radio to home machine shops and making all kinds of stuff.

Monday, November 5, 2012

Twas The Night Before The Vote

I may as well go down on record as thinking that the election isn't as close as most polls are saying. I think it's a very big win for Romney. In the range of 300 electoral votes.

Why? The polls consistently show independents are breaking very strongly for Romney, and the independents are what the whole election is about. Rs and Ds are expected to vote for their guy around 90% of the time, it's the swing state independents that will decide this - as they always seem to. Buried in a CNN poll that says the two are tied 49-49, it says

But a figure buried in the report shows Romney leading Obama among likely independent voters, 54 percent to 40 percent.

It's not just there:

A poll conducted two weeks ago by Democracy Corps
showed Romney with a 15-point lead among independents, 53 percent to 38
percent.

How do they keep coming to the conclusion the results are split evenly? By oversampling Democrats over Republicans. Throughout this cycle, the major polling organizations have sampled with the same turnout as the 2008 election. The problem is that 2008 was a record turnout for Democrats and a lot of Republicans sat it out. Why would they think every election will be the same?

Let's say you went to your favorite lake and caught the elusive world record bass. Or you went to your favorite place to hunt and shot the world's biggest elk or caribou. Would you think that from now on they'll all be that size? That's what they're doing.

The truth is that the pollsters have been really awful at judging elections recently - especially those involving Tea Party favorites. Take Ted Cruz from Texas. In his runoff election, against a very entrenched, very establishment Republican, he won by over 13%.

Remember the Chick-Fil-A day? When someone said, "hey, let's do a day where everyone buys Chick-Fil-A to support free speech" and the country turned out in insane record numbers. People waited in line hours for the chance to spend money there. Some stores ran out of food. I see parallels in the crowds between Chick-Fil-A and Romney's voters.

It could be that everything I think I know is wrong, too. Hopefully, we'll know by Wednesday morning. The last thing I want to see is a repeat of Florida 2000, or worse. We don't need the Stewart Smalley effect.

Mr. Greybeard, I must object to your description of independent voters as lacking in convictions and beliefs. I am an independant votor who is anti-offensive war but pro-strong military, entirely for laissez-faire unregulated business, against fiat money, pro-gay marriage, agnostic yet deeply spiritual and respectful of most religions, for the conservation of our wild territory but NOT an environazi, for strict constitutional restraints on government, and for the abolition of forced state education. Find me a party or even a candidate to vote for on my convictions, sir. The best I can do is Gary Johnson this time around, so he'll have my vote, even though he hasn't a snowball's chance. It would be a violation of my principles to punch my ballot otherwise. -Andrew S

Not that I think it makes a lick of difference but I think mittens will lose by a small margin. I'm a disenfranchised Obama voter who voted for him again! I just couldn't bring myself to vote for the RINO with the history of voting for gun control and increasing government interference in peoples lives. Hearing Gary Johnson talking about legalizing Marijuana and in the same freaking breath talk about needing to tax and regulate it (is there a LINO? Libertarian In Name Only). I don't think Obama is going to fix anything but Ryan giving the 55+ crowd a pass on social security reform while screwing us young folks is only going to absolve those who caused many of the budget problems.

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About Me

Retired radio engineer, follower of Christ, RF designer, mentor. Radio ham, home shop machinist, lapidary, silversmith, roadie cyclist, learning to be a rifleman, and home defender, - a guy with too many interests to keep track of.

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